Gift
by thehush
Summary: Buffy makes a wish but sometimes, wishes get declined. Season 7


Gift  
  
I wrote this after seeing the preview for "Chosen". There are possible spoilers to both Angel and Buffy, so be warned. Also, if you can, put in "I Can't See New York" while your reading, it creates a nice effect.  
  
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The end is never like what you expect, it's sudden and full of warmth - and its not always 'the end'. It was bright, so bright she felt as if she were blind. Yet, she could see through the light, and beyond it - and there she found a familiar pair. Two sets of hands pulled her into oblivion, surrounding her in love and benevolence - all there was. was good.  
  
A set of voices called her name. {Dawn.}  
  
Dawn opened her eyes, finding herself in the arms Willow and Tara. White hair circled their faces, creating small glints as it reflected in their lucid blue eyes. White flowing over them as robes covering their shimmering skin. She silently wondered, if this was were witches went after death. Had she stepped beyond the Wheel?  
  
{Willow? Tara?}  
  
A hand grazed her cheek before it raised her chin toward Tara. {Hey Dawnie, it's so good to see you grow.} She looked to Willow and the two shared a smile. {They finally gave us visitation rights.} the two women laughed lightly, causing a ripple in the void around them.  
  
Willow leaned toward Dawn and kissed the place above her brow. She faintly remembered being cut there, but the memory faded. {You're not dead.}  
  
Dawn took in a sharp breath realizing she had been holding it. {Where am I?}  
  
{You're in-between-}Willow looked to Tara. {life and-}  
  
Tara looked to Willow. {Death.}  
  
Without warning the world shifted and Willow and Tara were gone, replaced by a familiar presence wrapping strong arms around her. {This is where the Powers That Be lie.}  
  
{Spike?}Dawn looked up, finding herself staring into his face, but the void's characteristic lucid blue eyes and bright white light flowed over his every feature, making him angelic. {I don't understand. Who are you?}  
  
He rested his face against her forehead. {Shh. nuthin' to fear, Bit. All in good.}  
  
{Time.}The voice had changed as did the body, and she felt Giles take her hand and squeeze it. {I'm not the proper person to tell you who we are, but I am the one who can tell you why.}  
  
The white light faded and Dawn squinted as she found herself stepping onto the porch of her house. "Dawn?"  
  
She turned toward the front yard, her mother standing up from a freshly planted garden. "Mom?"  
  
Joyce laughed, giving her a puzzled look as she wiped her hands off on her jeans. "Honey, what's the matter? You're pale. You look like you've seen a ghost."  
  
Tears burned Dawn's eyes as she leapt onto her mother, embracing her as tightly as she could. "Oh god mom!"  
  
Another laugh escaped through the air. "Honey! What's wrong with you? You only spent the night at Amanda's, you couldn't have missed me that much!"  
  
Pulling away, she laughed at herself. "Oh yeah, I'm sorry. I just." her hand quickly wiped away hot tears. "Where's Buffy?"  
  
The confusion filled Joyce's eyes this time. "Buffy? I just called her this morning; she's unpacking her new apartment. Honey, did you hit your head?"  
  
Before her mother could feel her forehead for fever, Dawn rushed into the house and up the stairs. She could barely take in the new surroundings - it was like a dream. When she reached her room, a fresh trail of tears started down her face.  
  
Her room looked her age, filled with band posters, photos of friends and family. The chest where she kept her mythology books was gone, along with the sword Buffy had given her. Her old journals sat on her bookshelf along with dozens of fantasy novels, horror movies and one, maybe two, volumes of poems by Emily Dickinson. Her bed wasn't lined with stuffed animals anymore; they were hanging neatly in a small hammock over her computer desk where she found a framed photo of Buffy and her at the beach as little kids.  
  
Desperately trying to figure out what weird dimension she was in, Dawn looked under her bed and brought out the photo album she was relieved to find was in the same place. Opening it to the end, she started backwards and discovered there was more and more that this world had wrong.  
  
There were photos of Willow and Tara together; some of them happily posing in Sunnydale's park while others were of the three of them at birthday parties and diners. A shot of Xander and her making faces at the camera lay right above one of Riley and Buffy, sitting arm and arm on a bench outside of the local theme park.  
  
Quickly, she began to flip through the pages seeing pictures of unfamiliar boys and girls that looked to have passed through her life. Familiar faces that shouldn't have been also graced her book of memories - so many she had lost at one time.  
  
"Dawnie?" a hand stopped the flutter of pages and Dawn looked up at her sister. Buffy returned a radiant smile that was nothing but happiness. "You're back from Amanda's early. You don't normally come home till twelve." The laugh that filled the room made her heart swell. "You're just in time for me to carry you off to my place so I can put to you work."  
  
"Buffy." Dawn felt tears burn her eyes again. "You're smiling."  
  
Again, the distinctive Summers features of confusion greeted her. "Yes, I'm happy to see you, and I'm in a good mood. Why are you crying?"  
  
She couldn't stop the questions. "Where's Spike and Anya? Where's Angel and Faith? Did Giles go back to England? Does mom know you're the Slayer? Isn't Riley supposed to be doing governmental work? How'd Mom and Tara come back from the dead? Is Willow still Wiccan? Where are all the Potentials? Did I get hit by a car when I was fifteen, go into a coma, and suddenly wake up on our porch! What's going on!"  
  
Calmly, Buffy reached out and touched her cheek. {This is why.}  
  
The sickening feeling of lurching back into the void was worse than the knowledge she had been given. {What was that place?} Dawn asked weakly.  
  
{A time ago, the Powers That Be created a timeline, a thread of a world. Its soul purpose was to release the people they chose worthy into an existence without the mystical layer the next world held. A demon you know as Angel placed his son under their care and wished for him a better life than the one he had to offer. That world you passed through was that thread of time, and that is where Angel's son lives now. He lives without knowledge of the powers that lie in your present world. He has a family, he has friends, and most of all, nothing from your world can destroy it. No vampires, no vengeful gods, nothing hiding in the darkness. Your sister has made the same wish - but she has given you the choice to decline or accept. This is something the Powers have not experienced before.}Buffy's figure disappeared into the light and Xander's appeared in her place. {But we are the Powers That Be and in your kinds hour of need, we accept the wish of the Slayer, the last Guardian, and make it so.}  
  
White light washed over Xander's body, blinding Dawn as light overtook her. It was then that she knew what had to happen. She opened her mouth and then her burning eyes, and shouted toward the raging void before her. "I don't accept!"  
  
Everything stopped, darkness shoving her forward and then back again as she woke up in Buffy's arms. She gasped for breath, barely squinting when sunlight hit her eyes. "Buffy!"  
  
"Dawn!" Buffy stopped, tears blurring her eyes. "Dawn! Your alive, oh God I thought you were dead!"  
  
Dawn wrapped her arms around her sister's neck and buried her face in her shoulder. "You made a wish! Why did you make a wish!"  
  
Buffy shook her head. "I don't know what you're talking about, I've been right here waiting for you."  
  
"Xander?" a meek voice replied beside her. Dawn looked over as Xander silently kissed both her forehead and Willow's as she woke. She noticed the white fading from her red hair as soon as it disappeared. "What happened?"  
  
"It's a long story." She heard Buffy answer as they all stepped out of the recently created cave, breathing in the cool fresh air of a California morning  
  
** I got the idea from a series of Holly Lisle books () she wrote. The idea is spirits go to the wheel of life to wait till they can be reborn. 


End file.
